Don't politicise language

OME POLITICAL FORCES try to exploit societal aspects such as language, culture, or social categorisation as resources which may ultimately turn into political capital.

- BADRI NARAYAN

Some of them also use emotions and such linkages to mobilise supporters. All sorts of identities — social, cultural, and political — have been used for mobilisation in electoral politics.

These resources are used in two ways — first, by recreating positive emotion, and secondly, reproducing negative emotions — for political mobilisation. The recent debate on the three-language formula in the Indian education system has been reignited by a few state governments led by Tamil Nadu. This may be seen as an attempt to stir up negative emotions around language aimed at specific political gains. Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin has shown his disagreement with the three-language formula and sought to continue education in his state in two languages. It is clearly an effort to deploy language as political capital. Language as politics is being used in two ways here. On the one hand, it is inculcating suspicion that through the three-language formula proposed by the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, Hindi may emerge as the dominant language. Secondly, in this way, the Tamil linguistic identity may be honed by creating negativity around this formula.